“He likes eggs, right?” one of the voices asked. The owner had carried sowhere to sit in a chair. I still had trouble making out what they were saying, and opening my eyes wasn’t happening just yet.
“Yes, we need a lot of eggs,” said a second, different voice. Sothing suddenly slled quite good, and then I felt hands pull my mouth open and push so of the good slling stuff inside. The hands then forced to chew. I managed to choke down the food.
The second it hit my stomach, it seed to evaporate into . I felt almost alive again. I wasn’t anywhere near normal yet, but I managed to open my eyes. The figures I saw weren’t any real surprise, as I hadn’t interacted with many people here enough to be on a first-na basis. Cecile and Elicec had, to my luck, spotted . “Thanks,” I whispered, barely.
The first bits of egg on my own took nearly five minutes to get down, but by the ti I had hit the second plate of eggs I was shoveling them in with no regard to what I looked like. My stomach felt bottomless, and I was determined to prove it wrong. I ate more food in the next hour than I think I had eaten in the last three months combined, but I was finally starting to feel like a real person again. The next ti I risked overdoing it to that level, I was going to need to keep so food on hand.
“So, uh, Dave, you don’t look like soone tried to kill you so much anymore. What happened?” Cecile asked.
“Bad idea, well no, good idea, good results, bad after results. I tinkered around with my skill again at the suggestion of l to push myself as hard as possible. He seed pretty worried when I t him earlier, so I decided to listen. Not really sure what happened afterward. It was probably a really weird dream, but hey, I did shoot up to level ninety-three this ti and even gained an attribute to resist mana backlash. So win-win,” I said, not really feeling the enthusiasm I was trying to show. I didn’t want them to worry about .
“Okay, that’s great, and you didn’t even die! We’ve gotta be qualified for a few more dungeons now!” Cecile said. I hoped he was right.
“You’re going to hit your first level threshold soon. Do you know anything about those yet?” Elicec asked. I rembered seeing the term sowhere, but what I considered at the ti as high-level issues were not sothing my reading had focused on.
“No, I assu I hit so barrier or sothing at a certain level? Do I stop leveling, or does it change sothing else?” I asked.
“Kind of both. At level one hundred, the multiplier for how much experience is needed to get to the next level starts to radically increase. Right now, the amount needed is just doubling every ten levels. The first hundred levels are generally considered the novice period, and despite the na, most people don’t actually get past them,” Elicec explained.
“Wait, really? It doesn’t seem that bad,” I asked, sowhat confused. While the dungeons had been great initially, the people starting this in their pri with a better idea of what was going on should be fine.
“Yeah, I can’t tell you why exactly, but once you start down this path, it just gets more and more dangerous, and a lot of people can only see the potential rewards,” Elicec explained. I thought I understood it now: idealistic kids facing off against things they had no real idea about, especially with how secretive the Arena apparently was; most of them were actually going in as blind as I was.
“Let’s go back to a less depressing topic. Any idea what the new formula is for leveling?” I asked, trying to change the topic. The idea of so many kids and young adults dying wasn’t helping my anxiety.
“Nope, just know that’s the first. There are more too sowhere, but Dad didn’t really know much more, and that hasn’t been my focus here either,” Elicec answered. That would slow down, of course, but it wasn’t the end of the world in any way. I’d just need to unlock more dungeons for my simulator. There was still plenty of ti for that here, And while I was curious, I had no plans to waste any ti looking it up. I’d learn it soon enough on my own.
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“At my current rate, I should figure it out pretty soon anyway. I might try another dungeon or two tonight and hit it, but I’ll decide that after I figure out my attributes,” I said. At the very least, I needed to max out my new mana backlash one. It should make using the simulator safer.
“We were on our way here for a nice pre-dinner starter course. I’ve been really working on getting the hoe ready for so harder fights, so I've gotta eat a lot, which is what you need to do with your training, too,” Cecile answered. I had already decided on that truth.
“I know, I know,” I said, looking over the nu for an option for take out or delivery, sothing like that. I didn’t see anything, so I selected the option to call the waiter instead.
“How can I help you, sir?” He said imdiately.
“Is it possible to get food to or ordered to my room, or sothing like that?” I said, willing to accept a ton of options as long as I wasn’t forced to co back here mostly dead after every hard simulation run.
“Yes, just say the destination you want it at before selecting it. You can also add a ti for later deliveries. Is there anything else I can help you with?” The waiter asked.
“Nope, that was perfect, thank you,” I said, letting him get back to whatever else he did. I started picturing all the food I was going to have ordered to my room tonight. I didn’t use to think about food this much, it had to be an effect of just how much energy I needed now for my core.
“Excuse , are you Dave?” A ek voice interrupted food fantasies, and I spun my head to find the new source of the voice; there was a tiny little gray creature walking into the room.
“I am. Do I know you?” I asked.
“No, I’m Glorp, Pryte sent with a ssage!” Glorp said. With his large black eyes, Glorp reminded of the common depiction of Martians.
“Dave, be nice to him. He looks like an official courier. Do you want to join us for a al, Glorp?” Cecile said.
“Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize that was a thing, and of course, you’re welco to join us like Cecile said. Did you say Pryte had a ssage for , though?” I asked. Pryte had never reached out before. What did he want now?
“Sorry, can’t stay. The offer is very appreciated, though. Pryte said that the paperwork moved up the chain much faster, and you have a few weeks at most to get back to your ho before soone cos looking for you here.” My eyes went wide as I heard the ssage. Well, that put a damper on the idea of finding soone else to help us. There wasn’t enough ti for that. Had l known sothing already that he couldn’t say? Is that why he gave the warning?
“Thank you. You’re sure he said weeks, though?” I asked, hoping it was possible there was a miscommunication sowhere. I just didn’t think either I or the brothers were strong enough to take down the invading orcs yet, not that I won’t try if it cos to that, but I really wanted more ti.
“Yep, he made repeat it three tis. Sorry for the bad news, gotta go,” Glorp said as he retreated back out of the room. So much for any consideration on pacing myself, I was going to have a very busy few weeks.
“What do you wanna do, Dave?” Elicec asked. Cecile had the sa stunned look on his face that I’m sure I had monts ago.
“I need to get stronger, faster. So, for tonight, I will stick to my original plan. Tomorrow, we grab breakfast and talk to l. We need a list of all the dungeons in this world in order of which we can most likely survive. We knock as many of them as quickly as we can by day. By night, I’ll rack up the simulator hours. I wish I knew exactly how many weeks they were giving ; a few is too vague. I have a feeling l might know more, though, and I’ll see about that tomorrow as well,” I said, laying out my new hastily built plan. It wasn’t much of a plan, mostly just a gauntlet of trying not to die, but that was the best I could do at the mont.
“Dave, be careful, man. I know you’ve gotta push yourself now, and you’re real worried about your ho and kids, but rember, if you screw up and die, then we have no chance,” Cecile said; he didn’t look happy with the turn of events, but who was? I understood his sentints, though. He was just worried about .
“It’s alright, Cecile. I have no intention of killing myself through training, whether the vision I had was real or a weird hallucination earlier. I saw my children back on Earth, and I’m going to do everything I possibly can to save them. I promise I’ll see you two in the morning,” I said, forcing a large smile to add to the reassurance.
I ordered a ton of food to my room and made my exit. Ti was short, and I had to get everything allotted before forcing in a few more simulator attempts. It was going to be the first in a series of long nights.
Mana backlash as a power source is an extrely dangerous path, but it is viable. There's a group of warriors that call themselves Masokinetics, and they utilize their own backlash pain to push their spells even stronger. So of them are even capable of fighting well beyond the point they should be dead and yet sohow returning very much alive in the future. These are the elite warriors of the Phrentic Collective.
Mana Sources by Henjen Klank
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